Larger Than Life
by LovinLife4ever
Summary: What could this cute, worldly, sweet, rich guy possibly have in common with me? Ryella Oneshot my first ryella... tell me what you think and be brutally honest


**Be kind... this is my first Ryella. I actually started writing this oneshot a while back but dropped it. And what better to do on a writers block then to write a nice random oneshot? I wasn't going to post it, but I wanted a brutally honest opinion on how it turned out... and I can trust you guys to give me that, right? So pleeeeease tell me exactly what you think. If it sucks, tell me because I seriously want to know. Enjoy...**

I worriedly pushed a few locks of stray hair out of my face and frantically dusted off my light pink blouse. I quickly checked to make sure that I looked presentable before Fulton got in. I sat down at the end of Fulton's desk and looked down at my watch. 3: 27, he was twelve minutes late. I started drumming my fingers on the hard wood desk.

Fulton had called me in down to his office and rumor had it that he was planning to put me in charge of the spa section of the country club... this was my first shot at management experience, ergo, this was the first major step in my perfectly mapped out life plan (which would eventually lead me to Princeton, then will eventually end in me starting my own law firm), ergo this was basically the biggest meeting of my entire life so far.

I heard the door open and I stood up and turned around. "Mr. Fulton! I'm so glad you're here! I was actually hoping that we could talk about-"

"Relax... it's just me." A blonde figure entered the doorway. "You can turn off the telemarketer voice." Ryan said, entering the room, sitting on the edge of Mr. Fulton's desk, and popping a handful of very expensive truffles (the ones Fulton kept on his desk and only offered to the highest paying customers) into his mouth as if it was no big deal.

"Ryan! What are you doing here!? You can't be here right now! If Fulton comes in here he'll think that I'm invited guests into his office while he's not around! Ryan you have to get out of here now or... or I'll get fired!" I yelled, now pacing back and forth across the spacious office.

"Whoa! Cool down... if you must know, Fulton sent me to tell you that he was going to be late on account of the fact that he was having coffee with Troy and a few of college reps." Ryan said, getting up and twirling Fulton's solid gold pen as if it wasn't his uncle's most prized possession in the world.

I blushed at the mention of Troy... ever since I caught him kissing Sharpay by the poolside, I didn't exactly stay that social. It was weird because when I saw them I thought to myself _See? That's how a kiss is supposed to be... not all tense and emotionless like you and Troy have..._ and because of that, I really couldn't stay mad at Troy, because I knew that what we had just couldn't compare to anything Troy and Sharpay had in that one kiss. And I could understand where he was coming from, I mean, he went for someone more glamorous and interesting instead of the girl who has really only moved from one suburb to another. The thing was, Troy was too big for Albuquerque, and he knew it, so naturally he went for the biggest thing in reach which at that point was Sharpay... they were just both so... larger than life, like they lived in a completely different world than I did. The thing was, I always thought I was too big for Albuquerque too (or at least, my brain was, and I guess it dragged my social life along with it), I just didn't hate it here as much as they did.

"I-I'm sorry... I just... I have this all mapped out and I can't afford to have it all messed up." I crossed my arms and looking down, sort of embarrassed about how I had been acting. There was this stupid voice in the back of my head going _See? This is exactly why Troy left you, nobody wants to be part of some stupid plan, all guys want someone spontaneous and wild... basically anything but you._

"So I'll just be going now..." Ryan's voice pulled me out of my thoughts. "Unless you want me to wait with you for a while or something." Ryan said as he walked backwards towards the door, part of me wanted to tell him that he'd better make sure that he wouldn't knock anything over, luckily the rest of me voted against it.

"No... I-I'm good." I said, still looking down. It took me a moment before I figured that eye contact might have been a good idea, so you know, he wouldn't think tat I was a total loser, I mean, we did hang out little bit over the summer, but after Troy and I went belly up... it was like everyone lost all will to talk to me, except for Ryan... but using my amazing genius-girl logic, I somehow came to the conclusion that the best thing for me would be to throw myself into work and become totally independent. My genius-girl logic also convinced me that Ryan lived in the same larger than life world as Troy and Sharpay... and to him, I was probably just an experiment, or a phase or something, and that in about a week he would lose interest... just like everyone else did. Only he didn't, and my genius-girl logic told me to just blow him off and I wouldn't get hurt... only my genius girl logic was wrong. I still really felt like I wanted to be part of something, not all alone, having nothing but that stupid nagging voice in my head.

"Okay then... I'll catch up with you later, and hey, maybe we could hang out or-" Ryan started, before he tripped over a small table that Fulton used to keep job applications in, taking down a rather large stacks of manila folders along with him. Looking back, it may have been a good idea to warn him not to walk backwards ahead of time.

I just stood there for a moment, gaping like an idiot, before I figured that might have been a better idea to help him up. "Oh my god... are you okay? You took a pretty bad fall." I asked, rushing to his side and bending over to help pick up the papers that were scattered all over the floor.

"Yeah... as long as Fulton doesn't figure out that I messed up his perfectly oiled machine by screwing up his applications." Ryan said, rubbing the back of his head and standing up. "Seriously once when I was seven, Sharpay started drawing little stars all over the labels on his filing cabinet, and he literally screamed in her face for messing up his color coding or whatever." He must have noticed that I got a little quieter after he mentioned Sharpay, because before I knew it, he had this guilty look on his face. "I'm sorry... I really shouldn't have brought her up. I mean, what happened between you and Troy was pretty brutal."

"No... really, it's okay." I said, not really even believing myself when I said it. I mean, it wasn't that I was crying myself to sleep, or writing sad love poems or anything, but I still missed him. But the thing was that I didn't miss Troy as a person as much as I missed the security of having someone there at all. "Here, if we start now we can manage to finish reorganizing this before Fulton gets back, he organizes the manila folders by date submitted then within those he goes alphabetically. It really won't take that long at all. I just hope that he won't get in early and see this, he'll fire me for sure." I said, shuffling through the papers, trying to find the right dates.

"Are you always this paranoid?" Ryan asked, picking up a few more papers and handing me ones for the correct date.

"Actually, I have a pretty bad case of OCD." I said, not realizing how geeky that sounded until it came out of my mouth. "It stands for obsessive compulsive disorder." I mumbled, blushing. "It means that I really can't rest until I believe that something is completely perfect."

"Oh! So that's pretty much just a big way of saying that you have a stick up your butt?" Ryan asked.

I blushed more. "I do not have a stick up my butt... I mean, just because I like things to be organized and freak out a bit when they aren't doesn't mean that I have a stick up my butt." I said, starting to wonder if it really did mean that I had a stick up my butt.

"That would be the technical meaning of the term 'for one to have a stick up one's butt'." Ryan said with a small chuckle.

"I'm not that uptight... am I?" I asked, suddenly feeling conscious of how tense I always was. "I mean... do I really come off as... a total spaz?"

"Sort of... I mean, I'm sure that you're not really that uptight... all the time." Ryan said, obviously trying to soften it up a little bit.

"No... I get it... but I can be edgy too, you know?" I asked.

"Yeah... I'm sure you can be..." Ryan said, sarcastically.

"Hey... I'm being serious here." I giggled. "I can be fierce and wild and dangerous, and all of those things." I said, slightly defensively.

"Look, I like hat you're innocent... I think it's cute. And I love that you actually show some concern for your future... it makes you different, and if you ask me, the whole wild-temptress thing is getting kind of old." Ryan smiled at me sympathetically and I couldn't help but smile back.

"So you don't think I'm boring?" I asked.

"No... I think that you're unique." Ryan said. "Not exactly a Sharpay level drama queen... but after being her brother for seventeen years, that isn't exactly a bad thing."

I smiled at him as I just finished putting away the manila folders. "But don't you want someone with... style? Someone who rubs elbows with the rich and famous? Someone who can dance? Someone who can take you places?"

Ryan smirked at me and shrugged. "I stopped finding that stuff impressive a long time ago." He gave me a breathtaking smile and looked down at me. "I'd way rather have someone who be happy no matter where they're at and do something about it instead of constantly complaining."

I blushed, I wasn't used to this. "Thanks." was my brilliant response.

Ryan smirked. "You know Gabriella, I like you. In fact I can kind of relate to you."

I looked at him skeptically. What could this gorgeous, worldly, rich, sweet guy have in common with me? "W-What do you mean?"

Ryan shrugged. "Well as weird as this may sound, we're both constantly being compared with Sharpay. I mean, compared to her, I'm the guy who follows her around and agrees with everything she says, and you're the quiet girl who digs math and is afraid of big crowds."

I scowled, thinking about it. "That... that is horrible."

"Sucks, doesn't it?" He shook his head. "It's not like it's her fault though. She's just... being Sharpay. But it still sucks. It's like people forget about the guy who just happens to like dancing, but can play baseball too, and the totally cute, sweet, smart girl who actually has goals in life past two weeks from now." I smiled at the compliment. "Of course it would help if we stopped being so dull." He stepped closer to me, so close that I could smell chlorine from when he was in the pool.

"H-How so?" I asked, trying to hide my smile.

"Well, I could start by doing this." He said, carefully lifting my chin, and bending down so his lips met mine, at first I was surprised, then the weirdest thing happened, I actually started liking it. It was like I just let myself go for a moment. _Hmm..._ I thought to myself, _maybe I did_ _a stick up my butt._

I was happily kissing Ryan when I heard the door open. "Check it out Troy! I guess she wasn't as heart broken as you thought." I heard a female voice say with a laugh that I knew could only be Sharpay.

"I guess not." Another voice said... it sounded older.

Ryan finally pulled away from me. "Hey Fulton, how was coffee with the fossils?"

Fulton entered his office, not looking half as angry as I had expected. "Fine, and I'll have you know that those men are not fossils... in fact I'll have you know that William Jackson just turned forty-three last month."

"Exactly... fossils." Ryan said with a shrug. "Sup Troy, Pay."

"Ryan." Sharpay nodded to her brother then looked up to the boy linked to her arm. "You know what Troy? I personally think that they're perfect together."

"Thank you every much Pay, but we don't need your approval." Ryan said, slinging his arm around my shoulder, sending chills down my spine.

"Oh please Ryan... last time you said that you came home with your head shaved and a black eye." Sharpay said, rolling her eyes.

I looked at Ryan for an explanation. Ryan looked down at me. "Extreme wrestling phase."

I nodded and smiled. "Look, I'm sorry that we used your office for... inappropriate matters Mr. Fulton, but I swear that from now on I will take my job incredibly seriously."

"Don't sweat it kid. Just don't think that you playing tonsil hockey my nephew impressed me into putting you in charge of the spa, your management skills did that just fine." Fulton said, making his way to his desk. "Hey Ryan, have you been snacking on my truffles?"

"What can I say? Those things a freaking amazing." Ryan said with a smile.

"Ew! Calories Ryan." I heard Sharpay say.

"Chill Pay, those thing don't have any more calories than those Twinkies that I saw you sneaking while mom was away." Ryan shot back.

"Twinkies don't cost forty-five bucks a box, seriously, stop it, those things are expensive."

"And addictive." Troy added, his first words since he got in the room. It was weird, because for the first time since I met Troy I didn't melt at the sound of his voice. He looked at me and smiled... but it was strange smile... like he was afraid that I would burst out in tears or something. "How've you been Gabriella?"

I lookd at him with a huge grin. I was about to speak I heard Sharpay's voice. "Oh come on Troy, she was just playing tonsil hockey with my brother, how depressed could she be?" Sharpay asked.

"So no one cares that I was just... kissing Ryan in Fulton's office?" I asked.

"Well, besides the fact that I am going to have to tell Taylor about this, no one really cares." Sharpay said with a shrug. I smiled, all of a sudden they didn't seem so larger than life any more. Which was good, because now, like it or not, I was part of their world now.

**Awww... Is it wierd that a person who usually portrays Gabriella as an uptight, spastic, she-witch had a Ryella outburst? I just wanted to try and make Gabriella someone else other than he evil one, so I figured, hey, why not a Ryella? Once again If this sucks, please tell me so I can make improvements on my Ryella writing skills (not that I see myself becoming a major Ryella writer in the future). I just had to add in Sharpay at the ending my stories just aren't complete without her. So thanks for reading!**


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